CEDAR RAPIDS, IA (IRN) – U.S. Senator Joni Ernst is cosponsoring a bipartisan bill funding diaper banks nationwide. Before Congress passed the last COVID-19 stimulus package in December, Ernst tried to get $200 million added to support diaper banks. That didn’t happen but Ernst is trying again for $200 million in a bill not associated with a stimulus bill.

IOWA (IRN) – Governor Kim Reynolds is defending her decision to lift statewide COVID-19 mitigation efforts, arguing that the statistics show Iowa is turning the corner in the fight against the virus and that the rules are unnecessary. She says she trusts Iowans to do the right thing.

DES MOINES, IA (IRN) – A measure that would require transgender people in Iowa schools to use bathrooms that correspond to the sex listed on their birth certificates won a subcommittee vote in the Iowa Senate yesterday. The measure would apply to people using bathrooms in elementary and secondary public and nonpublic schools.

DUBUQUE, IA (IRN) – A marijuana dispensary could open just two miles from the Iowa state line this spring. The shop would go in a small shopping center just a four minute drive from the Julien Dubuque Bridge. A dispensary could create $250,000 dollars in tax revenue for the city every year.

DES MOINES, IA (IRN) – About two dozen community members gathered in the cold Wednesday night to honor a man who was found dead in a portable toilet outside a Des Moines library. A snowplow driver clearing the parking lot near the Forest Avenue Library found the man’s body around 3:10 a.m. Monday. Authorities have not released the man’s identity or cause of death, but community members believe the man was homeless and trying to find shelter during subzero temperatures.